smart Car, Please!

The smart car. A better choice of a vehicle by Mercedes-Benz. Every time I bring it up when people complain about gas prices, I’m always met with the same complaints.

You say it’s not aesthetically pleasing. Okay, I can’t change your mind about what you think looks pleasing and what doesn’t but I like it and it’s practical. The smart fortwo is 2.5 m in length, that’s the width of a normal parking space. To put it into perspective, the Honda Civic is 4.4 m and the Hyundai Santa Fe is 4.67 m in length. Okay, smart fortwo seats two and the Honda Civic and the Hyundai Santa Fe seats 5. This is my segue.

The smart fortwo seats two, that defeats the purpose of carpooling. My turn, let’s be realistic. In the last, say, six months, how many times have you carpooled with more than one other person? In those six months, how many times did you drive in that car by yourself? It’s more accurate to think of it in distance traveled than number of times driven, but you get the idea. I know that some of you do carpool with more than one other person, but some of you also have more than one car in the garage and can easily swap for a night if you need a car that seats more than two. The rest of you always talk about carpooling but never actually do it. You might as well get a minivan because you never know when you need to seat more than five people!

Since we’re talking about carpooling, what about the rest of the gas-saving stuff? According to Insurance Canada, the smart car is almost 700 lbs lighter than the Mini Cooper. All else being equal, the smart car adds over 1.5 litre per 100 km fuel efficiency (see “Top 10 Fuel-Saving Tips“) over the Mini Cooper; that’s a micro class versus a mini class, imagine a mid-size SUV class.

You yell, “It’s not safe!” Mercedes-Benz, not safe? Really? Fine. You need hard facts and examples, right? I knew it, I read your mind. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says they can’t compare frontal impact across weight classes and since the smart car is in a class of its own we’re out of luck (see CTV.ca | Tiny Smart car gets highest rating in crash tests). The side impact ratings can be compared across weight classes though and it’s rating “Good” which is the highest safety rating. The side impact tests simulate a crash with a pickup truck or SUV. The smart car rated “Good” (highest safety rating) for the side impact rating.

Cars are designed to crumple and absorb energy, right? True, there’s not much crumpling in a smart carsome people call the smart car shell a walnut, but the smart car restraint system was designed to absorb most of this energy. The front and back actually do crumple, just not as noticeably as a normal car crash, where the front is over a meter long. The smart car is also equipped with all the new safety gadgets like an electronic stability control (ESC)  program used. Think of it as anti-lock brakes for steering; we don’t have to pump the brakes anymore like they did before automatic cars were brought to the market.

Just as a note, the 2008 Hummer H3 in the Midsize SUVs category rated “Acceptable” (second highest safety rating) for Side Impact and “Poor” (lowest safety rating) for Rear Impact. Size doesn’t matter.

While I have your attention, why don’t you take a look at those yummy hybrids too.